The fusion of yoga and Pilates, yogalates, can have profound effect in changing your body physically and energetically. Yogalates can transform your body through movement, breath and mind body connection. The mindful movement and exercise sequences in yogalates, combined with breath, enhanced muscle strength, flexibility, improved balance make us more aware of what our body needs. This results in a more toned, agile and capable physique. Yogalates really can change your body and much more…
When you start practicing the fusion of yoga and Pilates profound changes begin;
1. IMPROVED MUSCLE TONE;
Our bodies have 650 different skeletal muscles. The combined movements in yogalates such as plank pose, lunges, warrior poses, push-ups, tree poses and the varying sequences of these cause our muscles to contract in order to move our limbs and support our spine. These combined movements use the core muscles, gluteal muscles, quadriceps, biceps, triceps and much more.
After a yogalates workout, your body repairs or replaces muscle fibers that have worked through a cellular process to form myofibrils, new muscle protein strands. These repaired myofibrils increase in size and quantity resulting the growth of muscle (hypertrophy). Yogalates aids in building a strong toned body and improving endurance.
2. STRONG BONES;
Yogalates has an important role in building and maintaining bone density for healthy bones. In fact, Inactivity causes loss of bone! The movement in yogalates exercises causes the muscles to contract and pull or put tension in the bones. Did you know that bone is living tissue? Therefore, bone structure adapts over time as a result of the forces placed upon it. When you practice yogalates regularly, your bone adapts by building more bone and becoming stronger and denser. This is particularly important as we age when the amount of bone and muscle loss increases. Weak or brittle bones may result in a bone thinning disease called osteoporosis which can increase risk of falls, loss of mobility and bone fractures. Yogalates can change the body and assist to maintain healthy muscle and bone.
3. WEIGHT LOSS;
Yogalates, when practiced with mindful and healthy eating, has proven beneficial as it assists weight loss along with keeping your mind , muscles, bones and heart healthy.
The fusion of yoga and Pilates assists to improve your mindfulness and how you may understand and react to your body’s needs… through this mind body awareness you will start to choose food that is healthier instead of craving poor food choices. This leads to visceral (around the organs) and skeletal (the fat we see) fat and eating food that ultimately increases your fat accumulation.
Some yogalates poses and exercises that help stimulate circulation, our internal organs and build muscle it assist weight loss include;
Salute to the sun, bridge pose, triangle pose, twisted chair pose, shoulder stand, standing leg mount, spinal twist and so many more.
4. FLEXIBILITY;
Yogalates poses involve a great deal of flexibility work such as stretching along with muscle contraction. By contracting then lengthening and stretching the muscle, the muscular fibres re-align. Flexible but strong muscles assist in preventing joint pain and stiffness. Yogalates is an incredible way to shape the body, enhancing the journey to a leaner, flexible toned physique.
5. BALANCE AND FUNCTION;
Yogalates can enhance our body by improving balance and overall function. This is particularly important for performance in sport, confidence to enjoy life and for preventing falls as we age.
Yogalates assists with balance, focus, coordination and overall movement. Rather than doing still postures, balance comes with sequences of exercises, transitions from one movement to the next and developing alignment, stability, focus and strength.
6. IMPROVES MENTAL HEALTH AND REDUCES STRESS;
As mentioned above, yogalates can change physical body…., the movement the stretching in yogalates can release and relax the body and increases the blood supply and nutrients to the muscles. It also aligns and releases connective tissue, improving our overall function and the way we move, and feel, all of which supports mental health.
The movement and breath work in Yogalates changes our body and mind by reducing stress. By practicing yogalates regularly you learn to relax, so stress levels and [the stress hormone] cortisol reduce. We become less reactive. It’s not just exercise – it’s mind control.
The practice of the fusion of yoga and Pilates in yogalates combines movement, breath, strength training, coordination and mind body connection to change our body.
It’s YOUR Body, and we only have one! Why not make a change with yogalates now.
https://beyogalates.com.au/get-started/
Lisa Wilson
